Shane Richie affair: He cheated on me, but I still feel sorry for him, writes Coleen Nolan

SO can a leopard ever change his spots?

Can a bloke who has cheated in the past ever really put the lies and deceit behind him and remain faithful?

It’s a question I’m asked almost daily as the Daily Mirror’s agony aunt. But this weekend the ­question came into sharp focus again with the latest case of a TV celebrity being exposed for having a six year affair.

And what made this weekend’s Sunday Mirror story very different – and gut-wrenching – was that this time the celeb was my ex-husband Shane Richie.

As I read about Shane’s sex sessions with Alison Hall, who’d been running his fan website, it was like stepping back in time.

During the years we were together Shane also had a long-running affair with a dancer. Later I discovered there had been plenty of other women too. It totally destroyed me.

But when our marriage ended it virtually destroyed Shane too. He was devastated that his cheating had destroyed our family, broken our hearts and caused untold damage for our sons.

And that is why I held on to the hope that this particular leopard would change his spots. I really believed he could do it.

But maybe some leopards just end up disappointing you – and ­themselves.

When Shane settled down with his new wife Christie he seemed genuinely happy. They’ve had three beautiful children together and Shane would be the first to tell you he adores his wife and loves being a family man.

And I don’t doubt that for a moment. But for some men that just isn’t enough.

Shane loved me and adored our sons Shane Jnr and Jake too.

He would ring me 100 times a day to say how much he loved me and missed me.

And it was that absolute ­devotion which made it ­impossible for me to accept for years that he would really be cheating on me. How could he?

RELIEF

But all the time there were hints and clues that he was playing around. If I ever ­challenged him he’d deny it flatly until I became convinced I was going mad.

In the end, finding out about the affair was almost a relief. Because in the end it is the lies which are the killer.

Yes, it’s horrific accepting that the man you love has been having sex with another woman. But it’s the lies and loss of trust which keeps you awake at night afterwards.

And that’s why my heart breaks for Christie. Because I know that sickening feeling of discovering everything you thought was real was something else entirely.

And I wouldn’t wish that on any woman in the world. When the story about Shane broke on Sunday morning my phone was buzzing with messages from friends and family.

I think some people might have expected me to be gloating. But in ­absolute honesty all I felt was just incredibly sad.

When you discover your husband has been cheating on you it is like everything in your world been chucked up in the air and you’re not quite sure where anything fits.

But to have all that in the full glare of publicity is 100 times worse. Every time you go to the shop you feel people are giving you pitying glances and however well meaning they may be you just want it to stop.

When it happened to me, one of my friends advised me not to make any ­decisions in haste or based on pride.

And that would be my advice to Christie. Don’t react just because you feel people expect you to chuck him out of the house in some dramatic gesture.

And when you are in love with someone it is hard to walk out on a marriage – whatever some people might think (who’ve never been in the situation themselves!)

But most of all Christie will have her three young babies to consider and be desperately trying to work out what is best for them.

PROTECT

When it happened to me with the same man it was my two gorgeous boys that got me through it. And it’ll be Christie’s babies that get her through it too.

Because once you have ­children your key thought has to be how to protect them.

Even on Sunday my first thought was to warn our sons about the story before they wandered into a paper shop and saw it all over the front pages.

So why would a man who has the perfect family which he loves go about destroying all that for a quick s**g? It’s like a form of madness or self destruction.

I think men can separate sex and love in a way that most women can’t. But if that’s the case they have to be honest about that – with themselves and those around them.

Because the only way you can ever learn from a mistake like this is to be brutally honest about it and then try to move forward.

Everyone is entitled to their mistake but they have to learn from that mistake.

I thought Shane had learnt from the destruction he brought to our family.